Stop! In the name of love

by Julie Alpine-Crabtree

It has been a week of separation anxiety. Of kids both screaming, half ripping my clothes off as I try to squeeze myself out of the nursery school door without them. (The nursery school they love.) Of me screaming inside, feeling like I’ve fallen off the face of the earth, pacing and planning how to climb back on again.

And of happy partings. Of issuing threatening notices (thank you, Seltzer) to a publishing house that had reissued one of my books under a new title without permission, thus infringing copyright law, passed it to a new distributor (complete with skanky new cover) and made it available for sale without one shred of up-to-date contact information for me, so no possibility of me being paid any monies earned from sales of aforementioned book.

It matters not that the book was written under a pen name, its genre dubious (is the acronym ‘BDSM’ allowed on a mummyblog?) What is important, is that I, David, took on them, Goliath, and, well, got my own way.

And that’s what the kids have been screaming about. Getting their own way. Or not, as the case may be.

Tomorrow isn’t a nursery day. I plan to bake cakes with them. Or go to the park. Or let them watch Andy’s Wild Adventures on a loop. You know, just good, clean family fun. Because the irony is that if I give them something to really miss, rather than mummy staring at a screen and tearing her hair out over rapidly approaching deadlines, rental prices in catchment areas of good schools and the general, back-breaking monotony of trying to keep on top of basic home maintenance, chances are they’ll feel so secure, well-loved and content, they won’t cry the next time I go.

And if they do? I’ll simply order them to cease and desist. It’s got a certain ring to it, n’est-ce pas?